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Desert 25 February 2011

Posted by marisacat in 2012 Re Election, AFRICOM, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Pan Arab Revolt - 2011, WAR!.
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Tobruk, Libya: Goats walk past a surface-to-air missile at an abandoned air force base      [Patrick Baz/AFP/Getty Images]

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1. marisacat - 25 February 2011

catnip posted this at the end of the previous thread:

At least 5 dead in Libyan chaos, France says Gadhafi ‘must leave’

…while Obamalama won’t even mention his name.

Britain: Britain is pushing for United Nations measures against the Libyan government, including asset seizures, travel bans and sanctions, Prime Minister David Cameron said on Friday.

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ms_xeno - 25 February 2011

Well, we got the Democrats to leave WI, so why not Gadhafi?! :p

(Sorry. It really has been that kind of week.)

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Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011

LOL

they made a virtue of their propensity to avoid conflict … I’ve learned to ask for no more than that from them.

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ms_xeno - 26 February 2011

…I’ve learned to ask for no more than that from them.

[snerk] Obama should lend them a French chateau somewhere filled with rich French people, or something…

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2. marisacat - 25 February 2011
ms_xeno - 25 February 2011

It’s so quaint that people vote for change and then expect change to actually happen, isn’t it? :p

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marisacat - 25 February 2011

oh yeah. Except they seem fine that no change occurred…

I read a piece during night at Politico (which is heavily backed by right wing money, no left liberal bone there), on how “the government” spied on and investigated James Risen of the NYT, going into his credit reports and financial and banking records, phone logs, etc. Grand Juries and subpoenas and so on…

Had to read ALL THE WAY to page two to see that it was both Bush / Mukasy AND Foundling and Holder. Oh so shocked. Shocked! what rooms are the gambling in? (snicker)

Gets old.

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ms_xeno - 26 February 2011

…investigated James Risen of the NYT, going into his credit reports and financial and banking records, phone logs, etc…

Hey, if Risen’s managed to get this far without peeing into jars for total strangers as part of a job app, he’s doing better than me. :p

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marisacat - 26 February 2011

I think it is a laugh and half that someone who really is part and parcel of the game, is investigated at all.

Gee. Rogue statments over heard in some drinking establishment. Makes one wonder.

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3. catnip - 25 February 2011
Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011

jeebus wept

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4. catnip - 25 February 2011

Is it just me or…?

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marisacat - 25 February 2011

I am watching movies, trying to take my mind, what is left of it, off things….
:lol: … :roll:

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catnip - 25 February 2011

Sounds like a good idea.

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marisacat - 25 February 2011

[Re re re re re] Watching an old John Le Carre with Alec Guinness, Smiley’s People… Guinness has arrived to a street in London… :lol: the camera pans over the street name:

Battle of the Nile.

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5. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011
ts - 25 February 2011

I kept clicking on next. It gets better.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011

I like 11 – “Opiate of the masses”

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ts - 25 February 2011

I like…”Having a Penis Means a Male God Wants You in Charge of Women”

Apologists for patriarchy and male privilege are among the most ridiculous and absurd defenders of any sort of unjust privilege that you can find. When you get right down to it, all their arguments ultimately reduce to waving around their genitalia and insisting that because their genitals hang down and outside their bodies, they have divinely-sanctioned authority to be leaders and deciders in the family, in politics, in business, and in all of society. So a penis is a badge of leadership.

The actual arguments they attempt to use lack any intellectual, philosophical, or moral credibility and this is because it’s all just a smoke screen to distract attention from the fact that their position reduces to “because God gave me a penis.” They don’t notice this, though, because they are just so engrossed with their penis and/or are upset that others (mostly women, but also some men) refuse to acknowledge the leadership-granting qualities of the penis. Take one of their arguments and insert “Look, a penis!” and “God gave me a penis!” every so often to get a more accurate picture of what’s really going on.

To be fair, not every defender of patriarchy and male privilege relies upon the importance of God giving some people a penis. Some defenses of patriarchy are secular and try to argue that male superiority is natural — as if the evolution of a penis was necessarily accompanied by the evolution of natural leadership skills. Secular patriarchy is no more rational than religious patriarchy, but it’s a bit less honest because it refuses to acknowledge its own religious origins. It’s like attempts to secularize homophobia as if the religious arguments could be secularized simply by replacing “God” with “nature.”

I suppose that if we really thought that genitalia could be a sign of superiority, then wouldn’t it be more rational to think that women were the superior ones? After all, their reproductive organs are inside their bodies where they are better protected. Shouldn’t our leaders bit a little less vulnerable to a swift kick to the crotch? If God designed one sex to be superior, wouldn’t it be the second one — the onecreated after all the flaws in the original model were revealed? “Whoops, those dangly bits are risky, let’s try that again…”

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marisacat - 25 February 2011

“Whoops, those dangly bits are risky, let’s try that again…”

Oh that gave me a laugh

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6. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011

Madison police chief wants to know why governor considered using agents provocateur

“I spent a good deal of time overnight thinking about Governor Walker’s response, during his news conference (Wednesday), to the suggestion that his administration ‘thought about’ planting troublemakers among those who are peacefully protesting his bill. I would like to hear more of an explanation from Governor Walker as to what exactly was being considered, and to what degree it was discussed by his cabinet members. I find it very unsettling and troubling that anyone would consider creating safety risks for our citizens and law enforcement officers. Our department works hard dialoging with those who are exercising their First Amendment right, those from both sides of the issue, to make sure we are doing everything we can to ensure they can demonstrate safely. I am concerned that anyone would try to undermine these relationships. I have a responsibility to the community, and to the men and women of this department — who are working long hours protecting and serving this community — to find out more about what was being considered by state leaders,” Wray said in the statement.

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7. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011
8. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011
marisacat - 25 February 2011

Everybody lie down on the sacrificial altar and present the naked neck for cutting. Try to stay alive long enough to hold the bucket to catch the blood.

Don’t make a mess!! Most important!!!

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Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011

sadly, it’s always somebody else’s neck.

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marisacat - 25 February 2011

oh I agree…

I saw a clip of Randi Weingarten earlier. So classic. Won’t be her overpaid neck.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011

but she’ll look SAD when someone else’s arterial spray his shooting out …

… then she’ll attach the video to a fund-raising email.

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ts - 25 February 2011

We need money so that NEXT TIME we won’t cave completely (just mostly).

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9. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 February 2011
brinn - 26 February 2011

“it doesn’t sound terrible enticing, no…”

No, it sure doesn’t. Good for him for getting the question:

“do you think that 435 members of congress, mostly well-to-do, mostly white, mostly male, should make that decision for that woman and that child?” on the record….

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marisacat - 26 February 2011

sigh. Therein lies the problem.

Or stupid women who if they ever had to make their own choices, most are there, among the 535 thru patronage, father, husband, party machine, etc., (sorry, but it is true), have forgotten the circmstances.

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ms_xeno - 26 February 2011

“…most are there, among the 535 thru patronage, father, husband, party machine, etc…”

You’re not allowed to point out class privilege because apparently it’s impossible for there to be both classism and sexism in the same room at once.

Oh, the indignation in certain corners (ie– Wasted Away In Lambertville) when I called her “Clinton II.” Oh, dear. How can you do that? She’s her OWN PERSON!!

Yeah, fine. And “her own person”hood is that of a smug, mediocre-minded, money-worshipping, murdering asshole who married a title and is thus compelled to trot it out all the time and everywhere. “Rodham” having not enough cache compared to “Clinton.”

But I’m the one who made her an appendage. She didn’t do it herself, knowingly, as a successful career move. She didn’t gravitate toward a life with a well-heeled, hateful shits because of being, herself, a well-heeled, hateful shit.

Bawwwww!!! Clinton Derangement Syndrome!! cry lambert and the baby lamberts…

Fuck idiots. Seriously.

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marisacat - 26 February 2011

oh basement angel has been getting nuttier. She rose to great heights to excuse the whole Ray McGovern incident (and I am not a fan of his, so fucking tired of him I could die. Acts as tho GHWBushiter was a kindly soul, and never did a bad thing).

She claimed Hillary is the liberal working inside the administration and to (start laughing) to maintain her cover she could not act differently at the speech when McG was dragged out.

Etc.

It completely rose to full-on delusion. I mean clinical nutsiness.

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marisacat - 26 February 2011

oh another thing abut Clinton, that utterly changes her personal history. That she chose to be an early settler of Arkansas with her great love, Bill C. As they embarked on enthusiastic and hyperactive policy wonkiness…. (etc)

Carl Bernstein sussed out when he did that book on her, she failed the DC bar. She skedaddled almost immediately inland.

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ms_xeno - 26 February 2011

I told myself that I’d still drop by there after I was booted, to read up on the few people who actually had a clue. Same after being “excused” from ADO.

Then I realized that forbearance is for suckers. So many really good news sources out there run by people who haven’t been utter condescending pricks to me. Why should I give an utter prick and his sycophants even one damn hit a month, when I don’t have to?

So I haven’t been back to either space since being “excused.” Not even once. Hell, flickr’s photos and a few online previews of superhero comics are a much better waste expenditure of my time, any day.

:p Wisdom comes to me, albeit slowly, yes?

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marisacat - 26 February 2011

BTW, I was reading at John Caruso’s and saw someone liberally use “fuck” with nary a word of chastisement. Cannot remember who it was.

I think both JC and lambert are waiting, perhaps expecting a further R rise and a nice route in as “an access blog” (dedicated to managing the barely left, etc) to some handy in-exile-better-Dmocrat-than-ObRama…..

lambert discussed quite a few plans for expansion recently. And ideas for fundraising for the blog.

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ms_xeno - 26 February 2011

Well, the real problem is that I trod on JC’s brittle ego and he couldn’t endure that.

The hilarity/irony of him shooing me away for a little ribbing of his AW-THAR-IT-AY, after he himself likened the dude who bowdlerized Twain to some kind of wannabe Stalinist or Right-wing oppressor, was not lost on me.

(Nor was Chris talking about the Black parents who wouldn’t respect his teacher-wife’s AW-THAR-IT-AY using imagery straight out of the op eds in a crappy Newhouse or Murdoch rag)

But I’m pretty sure it was lost on him.

“Good luck to them all!” :p

marisacat - 26 February 2011

once I realised JC lives here in SF and, more, thinks the SF Board of Supes is at all liberal.

Oh please…. they are not. From time to time there have been a couple left liberals on the board, across 45+ years that I can remember. But it ain’t too different from when it was ALL R and the first couple of liberals managed to get on it.

Two of te worst sell outs represented (they both just termed out) the poorest most needy districts, Tenderloin (think Hell’s Kitchen decades ago, around City Hall) and Bay View/Hunter’s Point, black, war time era neighborhood in the southen tip of the City…..

10. mattes - 26 February 2011

al jazeera showing Berlusconi & Gaddafi hugging and kissing. Italty sells close to a billion in military weapons to Libya.

History:

Facts about Silvio Berlusconi: Libya,
as discussed in Libya: Year In Review 2008:
During his August visit to Libya, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi offered a formal apology for Italy’s years of colonial rule as well as $5 billion in compensation for having occupied (1911–43) the country. In return, Italy was expected to receive favourable concessions in the energy sector and cooperation by Libyan authorities in combating illegal boat immigrants who sailed from…
http://www.britannica.com/facts/5/1018249/Silvio-Berlusconi-as-discussed-in-Libya-Year-In-Review-2008

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11. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 February 2011

Wisconsin Police Union Announces Solidarity with Occupation of State House

“Hundreds of cops have just marched into the Wisconsin state capitol building to protest the anti-Union bill, to massive applause. They now join up to 600 people who are inside.”

“Police have just announced to the crowds inside the occupied State Capitol of Wisconsin: ‘We have been ordered by the legislature to kick you all out at 4:00 today. But we know what’s right from wrong. We will not be kicking anyone out, in fact, we will be sleeping here with you!’

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Madman in the Marketplace - 26 February 2011

Sunday will be interesting … the police have announced officially that they’ll be clearing the Capital on Sunday night, I wonder how the rank-and-file cops will handle it.

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12. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 February 2011

Disability rights activists stage protest inside state GOP headquarters

It is small as protests go these days in Madison. A line of advocates, activists, and people with disabilities, some in wheelchairs, maneuvers its way through the slush Thursday, past honking horns and over puddles, from Capitol Square to a squat, nondescript office building at 149 E. Johnson. “Our homes, not nursing homes!” the protesters shout. Bringing up the rear on crutches, his right leg amputated below his knee, is John Nousaine. He has driven down from Superior to join this mission.

The line of 25 or so protesters closes in on its target: the state Republican Party headquarters. While an advocate holds the door open, a stream of motorized wheelchairs twists, turns, bumps and backs its way through the building’s narrow halls until it comes to a halt in a small lobby right outside the office of the party’s startled executive director, Mark Jefferson. A few protesters and a service dog roll right on in to Jefferson’s office, past several glass and brass elephants and an autographed Badgers football, and up to his desk.

“What’s this about?” he asks.

“It is about our lives!” says Dane County Board Supervisor Barbara Vedder, who was paralyzed in a car crash years ago and gets around in a wheelchair.

It is around noon Thursday, the start to what will be a two-hour occupation of the state GOP headquarters, the latest salvo in a battle by advocacy groups to get word out about Medicaid provisions buried in Gov. Scott Walker’s budget repair bill that would, they say, allow his administration to gut the public health programs many of them depend on.

It is also a kind of protest that Madison has not yet seen. Over the past two weeks there have been all kinds of demonstrations in the Capitol. Firefighters have marched with bagpipes. Family doctors have written medical excuses from street corners. Break dancers have slammed the marble in the Rotunda. Yoga instructors have greeted dawn with chants. Children have brought their stuffed animals and sleeping bags to the statehouse for sleepovers. But nobody had ever just marched right into the GOP headquarters and tried to take over, Jefferson says.

Activists tell him they are there because they are desperate.

They believe that changes to Medicaid programs in the bill, including provisions that will hand unprededented powers to the Walker administration to circumvent state laws and normal legislative processes in revamping the public health plans, could lead to cuts in their benefits that will force many of them back into the institutions that once housed most people with disabilities. And they don’t intend to let that happen without a fight.

“Are you even aware of the MA provisions in the bill?” Vedder asks. “We are able to be in our home with jobs and be productive members of society because of Medicaid. We don’t want to be put into nursing homes. This budget bill is not repairing us. It is destroying us!”

Jefferson asks what that has to do with him. “I’m just an operative,” he says. Protesters explain they won’t leave until he arranges a face-to-face meeting with Walker. Jefferson says that the Governor is too busy. “It’s a very trying time up there,” he explains to the crowd. “He’s in the middle of a budget crisis.”

“We’re in the middle of a life crisis!” Vedder replies.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 26 February 2011

Republicans almost always seem to be missing the compassion gene:

A woman asks how Jefferson and the Republicans and others with wealth are “sharing the pain.”

“This has a lot of people on the public dime,” he says, gesturing to the crowd in his office. On the other hand, he works in the private sector, he says, which is also hurt by the economy because “we have to rely on fundraising to keep our doors open.”

Jackie Turner asks how he justifies policy changes in the bill that would hand the Walker administration the power to make unilateral decisions about Medicaid programs, eliminating lawmakers and people like her from the process. “How could you support something that doesn’t require legislative and public input?” asks Turner, who lives in Monroe in Green County and has been a paraplegic since a car accident left her in a wheelchair decades ago. “How can you support that? Please answer that!”

Jefferson replies that he understands that “department bureaucrats making cuts gets people upset,” but that the provision has precedent: the Department of Natural Resources has initiated similar rule changes. “DNR is animals, fish, squirrels. We are humans! Do you understand the difference? Yes or no?” says Joe Kunz of Madison, who has muscular dystrophy, from his wheelchair.

The protesters are determined to speak, though for several speech is difficult. John Donnelly has cerebral palsy, and his face twists with effort as he tells a reporter why he has come in his wheelchair to the protest. He depends on Medicaid benefits, his friends help explain, to participate in community based programs and to live in his own apartment, with home aides who help. It takes several seconds for Donnelly to get each word out, but he does not give up. “I’ll … die … before… I go… into one of those facilities!” he finally says.

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diane - 26 February 2011

“What’s this about?” he asks.

“It is about our lives!” [YOU FUCKING MONSTERS - diane]

I don’t know what to do anymore with my feelings approaching OUT AND OUT HATRED, for people who ambitiously vote for the monsters (those monsters being both ReThuglican and DemocRat) who would prefer that the “riff raff” just go die somewhere …..

(and, if it need be said, I already DESPISE – THE MONSTERS)

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diane - 26 February 2011

(shit …forgot the ‘end blockquote’ after my bracketed ‘editorial’ ‘note’ …..have as good a weekend as possible all, hugs!)

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13. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 February 2011

UW-L faculty says yes to union

University of Wisconsin-La Crosse faculty members Thursday approved forming a union, despite the prospect that state action soon could take away any collective bargaining rights gained from the move.

The faculty voted 249-37 to organize as part of the American Federation of Teachers-Wisconsin. The 286 ballots cast represented an 87 percent turnout.

The two-day vote would have been canceled had the state Legislature passed Gov. Scott Walker’s budget repair bill, which calls for repealing collective bargaining rights that Wisconsin faculty and staff gained only two years ago.

UW-L faculty members said they weren’t daunted by the threat of losing bargaining powers.

“I think it’s galvanized the faculty to maybe push back a little bit,” said Darlene Lake, an associate professor of modern languages.

“I think we’re much better off with a union than without it, particularly if the bill passes,” history professor Deborah Buffton said.

Michael Abler, an associate professor of biology and an AFT-Wisconsin representative who has worked for years to gain bargaining rights, said the state battle “helped crystallize” the issue on campus.

“Unions aren’t just about collective bargaining,” said Susan Crutchfield, an associate professor and chairwoman of the English department. “Unions can make a lot of waves, because they’re organized.”

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14. catnip - 26 February 2011
15. marisacat - 26 February 2011

So bad. Barely the get up and go to write the cover story.

THE BIG IDEA – L.A. Times 2-col. lead,

“Obama seeks a new policy on Mideast:

He wants aides to craft an approach that emphasizes reforms without alienating longtime allies,” by Peter Nicholas and Paul Richter:

“[T]he president and other key White House figures … have told the Saudis they should support efforts by the Sunni royal family in neighboring Bahrain to work out a new power-sharing arrangement with Shiite Muslims … The White House also has told diplomats to expand their outreach to the allies’ opposition leaders, rising political figures and others who operate outside official government circles. … Aides said Obama recognized the need to shift gears soon after the Egyptian street protests began … ‘The president [told] us … we wouldn’t be simply responding to protests in individual countries, but revisiting our entire approach to take into account the changes that are taking place,’ the aide said. Obama directed them to elevate democracy and the expansion of political and economic rights ‘as core interests of ours in the region.’” http://lat.ms/hWXb1L

An administration in search of the active verbs. Harder than mountain climbing it seems.

GOOD LUCK!

WSJ Page 1 reports that the admin is “vowing” something or other… AND, wow, weeks later, freezing US assets of Qaddafi and 5 of his kittle pops.

Don’t make me laugh TOO hard.

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catnip - 26 February 2011

Obama directed them to elevate democracy and the expansion of political and economic rights ‘as core interests of ours in the region.

Winning the ME & African future! Time for another speech.

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16. catnip - 26 February 2011

Egyptian Military Cracks Down on New Protest

That honeymoon is over.

AJ blog:

February 26

1:30 pm The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces has apologised for the military’s response to the protests overnight and said the situation “wasn’t intentional”.

In a statement, the council promised such confrontations would not happen again.

They’ve obviously dipped into the Nescafe.

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catnip - 26 February 2011

Speaking of Nescafe: Mubarak and decaf coffee

Cute pic there of Obamalama and Mubarak having a giggle together.

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ms_xeno - 26 February 2011

[Shatner voice:] Someone… help me. Breakfast… refusing to stay… down…[/Shatner voice]

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brinn - 26 February 2011

Thanks for THAT! I’d vote for Shatner in a heartbeat over these stupid fuckers!

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17. catnip - 26 February 2011
marisacat - 26 February 2011

None of it is over… nor should it be.

Somebody find the ME Cliff (and the North African edition too!) Notes for Obby and Hilarious.

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18. marisacat - 26 February 2011

Nu

LINK

……………. 8)

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